The present invention relates to an apparatus, system and method of feeding flat articles to a sorter, and in particular, to an improved jogger apparatus for use in feeding a mail processing device such as a mail sorter.
Modern postal services, for example, the U.S. Postal Service, handle massive volumes of mail pieces on a daily basis. Machines for receiving and sorting these massive volumes of letter mail are known. Typically, such machines are adapted to receive large volumes of flat articles and sort the articles into a plurality of pockets or bins based upon selected criteria. In the case of letter mail, the criteria associated with the destination of the individual mail pieces may be an indicium such as a Zip+4 destination code. Typically, such sorting machines have a feeding station, sensing and detecting equipment for determining the appropriate output compartment or pocket for the article to be sorted and diverting gates or other mechanisms for selectively diverting articles to selected ones of an array of output compartments or pockets for the sorted articles. An example of an advanced sorting machine is the DBSC sorting device, available from Siemens ElectroCom, L.P., Arlington, Tex.
Devices for singulating and feeding mail pieces to a sorting machine are known. One such apparatus is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,947,468, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference for all purposes. Typically, such devices for singulating and feeding mail pieces include a jogger type conveyor which functions to advance mail pieces to a take off device that removes the mail pieces on a one-by-one basis so as to convert a stack of mail pieces to a singulated stream suitable for further processing. The jogger also severs to impart a jostling or bouncing motion to the stack as it is advanced in order to facilitate edging, or alignment of one set of edges of the mail pieces. The jostling or bouncing motion tends to separate the mail pieces and cause mail pieces pinched between adjacent pieces in an elevated position to move downwardly so as to align the bottom edge of such pieces with the remainder of the stack. Such prior art jogging devices comprise a series of chain driven fingers that travel though an oval path as the chain is driven around a pair of sprockets. The fingers engage a stack of mail, moving the mail as it is subjected to a jostling or bouncing motion. However, the fingers of such prior art joggers sweep through an arc as the chain passes over the sprocket adjacent to the loading end of the jogger. This results in an undesirable compression of mail between the fingers that hinders the jogging process. The improved jogger of the invention alleviates this shortcoming.
An improved jogger type conveyor includes a flexible carrier defining a closed path including a substantially straight transport segment along which flat articles are conveyed, a sloped loading end where flat articles are loaded on the conveyor and a discharge end where articles are discharged from the conveyor. The closed path defines a first vertical plane passing through the transport segment, sloped loading end and discharge end of the path. A plurality of fingers are coupled to and extended from the flexible carrier for receiving flat articles at the sloped loading end where the fingers move substantially perpendicularly through a second horizontal plane substantially perpendicular to the first plane and parallel to the transport segment. The flat articles are positioned on edge in a gap defined by adjacent fingers as the articles are loaded onto the conveyor. The jogger includes first guide means coupled to the carrier and second stationary guide means that cooperate such that the gap between the fingers does not decrease in size as the flat articles are loaded and conveyed from the loading end to the discharge end of the conveyor. Causing the gap not to increase results in flat articles positioned on edge in the gaps not being subjected to compression resulting from a decrease in the gap between the fingers.
In one aspect, the jogger includes plurality of rotatable guides around which the flexible carrier extends. In this regard, the rotatable carrier guides may be sprockets or pulleys arranged in a trapezoidal pattern. One suitable flexible carrier comprises a chain passing around a plurality of sprockets arranged in a trapezoidal pattern and wherein at least one of the sprockets is a drive sprocket.
In another aspect, the jogger conveyor comprises a return segment and a plurality of brackets coupling the fingers to the flexible conveyor. The brackets include a groove engaging projection for engaging a guide groove adjacent to the path to pivot the bracket as the bracket moves from the return segment to the sloped segment causing the fingers to assume a substantially perpendicular orientation with respect to the second plane. In this aspect, the jogger includes at least one side plate positioned parallel to the vertical first plane with a guide groove formed in the side plate, the groove engaging projection of brackets coupled to the flexible carrier moving through the guide groove and causing a finger coupled to the bracket to pivot to a vertical position as the bracket is carried from the return segment to the sloped segment of the path.
In another aspect, the jogger includes at least one rotating shaft extending parallel to the transport segment of the path, the shaft imparting a bouncing motion to flat articles carried between the fingers as the flat articles are conveyed through the transport segment. The bouncing motion tends to loosen a stack of flat articles compressed together and align the bottom edges of the flat articles for further processing of the stack.